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An atom consists of a nucleus of protons and generally neutrons, surrounded by an electromagnetically bound swarm of electrons. The chemical elements are distinguished from each other by the number of protons that are in their atoms. For example, any atom that contains 11 protons is sodium, and any atom that contains 29 protons is copper.
The ionization energy is the minimum amount of energy that an electron in a gaseous atom or ion has to absorb to come out of the influence of the attracting force of the nucleus. It is also referred to as ionization potential. The first ionization energy is the amount of energy that is required to remove the first electron from a neutral atom.
The atom is said to have undergone the process of ionization. If the electron absorbs a quantity of energy less than the binding energy, it will be transferred to an excited state. After a certain time, the electron in an excited state will "jump" (undergo a transition) to a lower state.
For example, the relative isotopic mass of a carbon-12 atom is exactly 12. For comparison, the atomic mass of a carbon-12 atom is exactly 12 daltons. Alternately, the atomic mass of a carbon-12 atom may be expressed in any other mass units: for example, the atomic mass of a carbon-12 atom is 1.992 646 882 70 (62) × 10 −26 kg.
The current theoretical model of the atom involves a dense nucleus surrounded by a probabilistic "cloud" of electrons. Atomic theory is the scientific theory that matter is composed of particles called atoms. The definition of the word "atom" has changed over the years in response to scientific discoveries.
A quark (/ k w ɔːr k, k w ɑːr k /) is a type of elementary particle and a fundamental constituent of matter.Quarks combine to form composite particles called hadrons, the most stable of which are protons and neutrons, the components of atomic nuclei. [1]
[16] [17] All organic compounds, those essential for life, contain at least one atom of carbon; [16] [17] combined with hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, sulfur, and phosphorus, carbon is the basis of every important biological compound. [17] Nitrogen (N) is found mainly as mostly inert diatomic gas, N 2, which makes up 78% of the Earth's atmosphere ...
Therefore, the radius of an atom is more than 10,000 times the radius of its nucleus (1–10 fm), [2] and less than 1/1000 of the wavelength of visible light (400–700 nm). The approximate shape of a molecule of ethanol, CH 3 CH 2 OH. Each atom is modeled by a sphere with the element's Van der Waals radius. For many purposes, atoms can be ...